Six reasons why a White Russian is the perfect holiday beverage

Eggnog is fucking revolting. We’re talking here about uncooked scrambled eggs with sugar. No man in his right mind would consume this toxic sludge on any other day of the year.

White Russians offend the lactose-intolerant. If you think the anti-smoking lobby’s social engineering tactics are extreme, try waving a Caucasian around a crowded room. You might provoke a slightly more hostile reaction by leaving peanuts at the kiddie table – but, seriously, why would you want to?

White Russians are like milk shakes. For alcoholics. These babies go down a little too easy, so guzzle responsibly. Knock back a half-dozen and you’ll be making passes at your grandmother.

White Russians are grown-up versions of piña coladas. I defy you to look like a responsible adult while straw-sipping from a bowl of tropical fruit and a tiny umbrella. You might as well have arrived at the party in a white limousine with your prom date on your arm.

Real men don’t drink Baileys. Sure, the commercials make it look like those hot women are gulping semen from shot glasses. But in the real world, chicks don’t behave that way in public and guys never wear purple velvet.

The Dude drinks White Russians. Need I say more? If you think I do, then you’ve clearly been home-schooled. Go away, you ponce.

How to make a classic White Russian

2 oz vodka
1 oz Kahlua
2% milk

Pour vodka and Kahlua over ice cubes in an old-fashioned glass. Fill with milk and serve.

I love my electric snow blower

I don’t fawn over yard implements. A lawnmower cuts grass. A rake collects leaves. Cutting grass and collecting leaves mean extra work for me. Extra work is bad.

I suppose these devices are labor-saving, in the sense that it’d take longer to manicure my lawn with pinking shears. But, seriously, giddy exhilaration for a yard tool? That’s like working yourself into a froth over oven mitts. Some things are simply beneath a man’s dignity.

Yet I find myself in near ecstasy for a tool that has rendered obsolete my utter distaste for shoveling snow. I’m talking of course about my brand-spanking-new Toro 1800 Power Curve electric snow blower. And, no, before you ask, this isn’t a paid endorsement.

I have a notorious reputation among friends and family for bad luck when it comes to consumer goods. Of the local grocery’s hundred or so identical packages of microwaveable tortellini Alfredo, I will always pick the one that was accidentally filled with Gerber mashed turnip. If I choose a vacuum cleaner off the shelf at Wal-Mart, I’ll invariably discover at home that the factory people forgot to install its suction parts. Every new car I’ve owned has been a stinker. Even my pricey MINI Cooper S, whose front and rear wiper motors and the entire power steering system blew just a few days after my warranty expired.

You may wonder, then, what prompted me to commit five hundred bucks to a skimpy-looking electric snow shovel, when a cool thousand would have acquired one of those massive, throaty, gas-gulping, penile implants you push around your driveway with every taut muscle your groin can summon.

Indeed, a self-respecting hunk of testosterone like me should warm mightily to the awesome geyser produced by an overpowered snow mulcher bristling with rivets and other manly features. But I’m not one for such extravagance. Sure, the price of petrol has dropped like Paris Hilton’s frillies, but it’s maintenance of the thing that exasperates me. Calculating the correct oil-to-gas ratio, polishing spark plugs, purging fuel lines of sediment – even if I were skilled enough to perform these tasks without setting myself on fire, I’d still hesitate. The machine should work for me, not the reverse.

In spite of my history with new gadgets, and ignoring my nefarious male ego urging me to more power, I opted instead for electric. A shiny red Toro, not vaguely reminiscent of the little red wagon I pulled behind me as a kid.

If you read the reviews on Amazon.com, this particular machine is the frugal snow-blowing connoisseur’s idea of manna from Heaven. Some reviewers literally gush like teenage girls at the mere thought of their exquisite devices – such is the geek subculture growing up around the Power Curve. I could hardly resist.

It was something of a challenge to find a dealer in Ottawa. For some arcane reason, Toro doesn’t seem to think of Canada as a good market for its snow removal equipment. We got only 13 feet of the damned stuff last year.

Anyway, I finally located a nearby reseller and called ahead to check for availability. They had one in stock and the next day was to be our first brutal snowfall of the season. I paid for it, sight unseen, over the phone.

I’ll spare you the details of my pickup and hair-raising transit home. Snowstorms bring out the jackasses in this town.

Suffice to say, I was nearly aquiver with anticipation by the time I plugged in my new purchase. I performed a silent genuflection, breathlessly squeezed the starter bar – and nothing. Not a peep. My spiffy new Toro sat there, mocking me with its dysfunction.

This of course is the point where lesser men would swear like lesbian feminists at a Larry Flynt film festival. Not I. Defective appliances are my kith and kin, so to speak. As it turned out, this particular malfunction was entirely the doing of my electrician, who’d been working at my home the previous month and somehow disconnected my outdoor power supply. No biggie. I plugged into a supplementary outlet and gave ‘er another go.

To say the Toro Power Curve works well is something of an understatement. It was like blending a Margarita with an industrial wood chipper. I made short work of my driveway – ten minutes, tops, and with a heavy accumulation of slush – then regarded my neatly swathed lane with the kind of masculine pride that comes after a bitter job easily accomplished.

My neighbors snicker now when I pull out my little red snow blower. I care not. My driveway’s just as spotless as theirs. And for the same reason I don’t drive an SUV – my dick’s big enough, thank you very much.

Christmas spirit in mean times

Retailers have a different perspective on the holidays. It’s not that we’re a curmudgeonly bunch – well, maybe some of us are; I know I am. But by the time the holiday shopping season kicks into high gear, we’re already dreading it.

Starting sometime in July or August, suppliers send out the first of their frequent, and increasingly alarming, order-now-or-forget-Christmas appeals. Most retailers don’t go into the black until December; yet we must dedicate considerable sums of our meager earnings to stock purchases that won’t pay off for another few months, then pray to the gods of consumption that this year’s seasonal buying frenzy doesn’t suffer a premature ejaculation. That particular money shot is virtually worthless if it goes off in your pants.

Forget for a moment that the Big Boxes have already decimated your market with their near-limitless advertising budgets and eye-popping discounts. (That’s more a problem for unwitting Wal-Mart employees, whose only protection from the deal-maddened mobs are a pane of glass and a faulty hinge.) Forget also that many consumers this year will defer their Christmas expenses in favor of simpler luxuries – like food, or heat for their repossessed homes.

Forget all of it. Because by the time those first holiday orders arrive at your transom, you’re already cringing from the mere insinuation of Christmas carols. You’re strapped for cash. You’re doing your best to ignore suppliers’ first (second/third/whatever) overdue payment notices. You’re stressed out and barking at your dog. Acquaintances come to greet you with a hearty handshake, but glimpse the madness in your eyes and fearfully retreat. Your only comfort is that other shop owners have the same haggard expression written across their faces. And there’s still three weeks left to Christmas.

So it is that I find myself wishing the holidays over, before they start. Which, truly, is stinkin’ thinkin’ but can hardly be helped.

I fear many shell-shocked consumers are of the same mind. When the news is nothing but bad – (Did you hear? Canada’s government is about to collapse. Happy holidays!) – it’s difficult to find joy in the spirit of these mean times.

But find it we must, all of us. Look for it in the company of friends and family. Look for it in the warmth of home after a long day’s labor. Look for it in the faces of your children, because Christmas still holds magic for them – and presents need not be expensive, or many, to fill their hearts.

We are not our credit cards. We are not our Calvin Kleins, or Perry Ellises, or Ralph Lauren Polos. We are whom we love, and how we love. We are conscious living things who can, if we wish it, find meaning enough in any small moment.

There’s snow now outside my window: huge, fluffy puffs of it drifting soundlessly everywhere around me. It’s breathtaking…